Apple recently released the news that with its next update to iOS 9 this fall (September), and it will include a new app completely streamlined and and made for iOS with a customizable news feed. This is a boon to WordPress users because your content can be submitted ahead of time for inclusion. Like right now.

Publishers interested in signing up can visit www.icloud.com/newspublisher with additional publishing tools available later this year. iOS 9 will be available this fall as a free software update for iPhone 4s and later, iPod touch® 5th generation, iPad 2 and later, iPad mini™ and later. Features are subject to change. Some features may not be available in all regions or all languages.

One thing I would suggest is that you have your image/logo ready to submit. Also, they will ask for your name, business name (if you’re an individual adding a blog, your personal name), blog name and address, contact information, language and audience choice. I chose “general” since my topics include more than just genealogy. If I’m accepted I would think I could change that to a specific audience if needed.

In the Apple Press Info they also intimated that at some point the app can be monetized by publishers.

I first read about this via WordPress Hacks (an excellent site, I must say) and you can read Kyle Eslick’s article about Apple News app here. Thanks Kyle!

You’ve Been Outed Hacker Scum!

It infuriates me that there are people in the world who have nothing else to do but create bots to go in search of vulnerable blogs that have their login as ADMIN. That said, it infuriates me further that I now know the IP address of one of them. Hello hacker in Germany…you scumbag.

How do I know this? Because I have a very valuable plugin called Limit Login Attempts. By using this plugin, I get email alerts whenever there have been repeated login attempts on my WordPress blog. Almost every day there are 16 attempts and then the IP address is locked out for 24 hours. I’m not affiliated with this plugin, I just think it’s a life, er, blog saver and I want to make sure everyone knows about it. So, Marcel Edler doing business as Optimate-Server, you can go to hell. Karma can’t come soon enough!

I know I’ve been talking about this a lot lately, but none of us want to have our blogs infected by hackers using brute force tactics to get into our files through using the default “Admin” login name. This should be one of the first things you change when you begin your blog.

Source: These are directions Website Defender gives in order to change your Admin name.

Login into your WordPress admin panel using your admin account.

Select the ”users” area from your dashboard panel, and click on “Add New User”.

Fill in the form and choose ”administrator” in the ”Role” drop down menu (remember to enter a strong web password and also check the password strength indicator to confirm that your new password is strong enough).

When finished, click on ”Add New User”.

Log in again using your new WordPress admin username.

Navigate to the ”Users” area.

From the users list check the box of the previous “admin” username and select ”Delete” from the drop-down menu.

Next, you will be asked about the articles posted under the the previous ”admin” username. Select the option “attribute all posts and links to:” and select your new administrator password. When ready click “Confirm Deletion”.

Make sure that the “display name” of your admin user is different from the username, especially if the admin user posts any blog articles. If the actual username is used also as ”display name” of the writer, a hacker can easily identify the admin username and target the account.

Here’s one way to keep blog brute force attacks from happening: If you have your WordPress login ID name as “Admin” change it right now! Did you go change it? Well, as soon as you get through reading this article, make sure you go and do it. Every moment of every day there are malicious “bots’ attacking your blog for vulnerabilities. Luckily for you there is a WordPress plugin you can download for FREE from the WordPress.org site named (no surprise) Limit Login Attempts that I can highly recommend. In the plugin settings I have it set so I get an email whenever there are repeated login attempts and it locks the bots out. Of course, they keep trying, but then, I don’t have my login name as “Admin” either. I do have a very strong password as well and change it now and then.

This plugin works very well and is easy to set up as well as fine tune for your blog protection. I highly recommend it.

If you would like more information about the plugin before deciding whether to download and install it the home page for Limit Login Attempts can be found either as a link on the WordPress.org site as I said above, or using my link here.